


Heartbeat: Arrhythmia

by Tieliva



Category: HEARTBEAT (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Timeline, Angst, F/F, Klein and Nyx swap, Storyline
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-01
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-16 07:33:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21267365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tieliva/pseuds/Tieliva
Summary: An alternate timeline take on the events of the game based on early concept art implying that at one point Nyx and Klein were in opposite positions in the story, and my extrapolation of how events would have followed after the fact. Tags may be added as the story goes, but for now I don't have anything specifically planned/don't want to spoil the things I do have planned.Note: I do not support Shepple or the things her and her girlfriend have said/done, but this game is still incredibly important to my life and my identity as well as that of many of my friends, so I'm writing this as a NaNo attempt for this year due to a recent surge in my passion for this game.





	1. Prelude

_A very long time ago, there was a brave woman named Eve Xin. Despite her many failings in battle, and the tumultuous state of the world, she decided that the war she was presented with was unacceptable. And so she saved lives on both sides, even in the face of the risk to herself from Mogwai who were supposed to be her enemies, and from the human soldiers who spurned her for helping the enemy. The truth of the matter was quite apparent to her. The war was built on a farce, and the humans dying were doing so due to a misunderstanding, their soulless leaders who mindlessly murdered and stole the world’s resources for profit were the true evil. So she decided to set about stopping it. As a Wuji Conjurer, she was an incredibly strong mage capable of making pacts with these Mogwai, magical beings native to the world humans were now inhabiting. She had three in total by the end of the war, and her many deeds of fame saw her catch the attention of the Mogwai queen, Han Verrine. Invited to the capital, she brought these three with her, and sealed the fate of the entire world._

_Her strongest Mogwai was a manticore general named Caesar, once one of humanity’s fiercest opponents in the war before he grew distasteful of the continued violence. She met him when his displeasure with war grew to be too much, and convinced him to help end it, making their pact. In the end, his greedy love for the Queen’s husband was his downfall, and though most are not aware of the truth of the matter, the Queen possessed his body and lives on in control of it._

_Her second strongest Mogwai was a common Cat Sith, a devilish and philandering woman by the name of Klein Gremory. She was Eve Xin’s best friend, and despite her attempts to understand Eve’s other Mogwai, she could not. Her distaste for them grew and festered much like the unfillable pit in her stomach that drove her from lover to lover, leaving broken hearts in her wake. In the end, when the Queen offered her anything she wanted in exchange for killing Eve Xin in retaliation for Caesar’s treachery, through gritted teeth and unshakeable guilt, she asked only for something to make her feel whole. And so, with the Queen’s hand in marriage secured, Klein Gremory poisoned Eve Xin and caused her death._

_Or so it would have been if not for her weakest and original Mogwai, Nyx Ronove. A humble, shy, and kind wisp that had been her dearest friend and lover for years before this. The woman who helped inspire Eve to try to prevent the war in the first place. No matter what was thrown at them, they were unshakeable as long as they were together. Or so they thought. In the end, when Nyx realized the Queen’s treachery and ran away with Eve to save her life while she lay dying instead of staying to fight off the royal guard and save her other friends, the distance between them slowly grew. Both of their hearts broken by Klein’s betrayal, they parted ways after a few years of trying to survive the pain together, but stayed friends for all the time after that, keeping Eve’s survival secret as she gave up on her former role and raised a family in a small town._


	2. Journey To Solburg

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An adventure begins!

_ June 5th, 22XX, Solburg _

Eve Staccato had never ridden in a boat before, and the experience was quite honestly a thrilling one. Though she was mildly disappointed to be moving from the country to elsewhere in the country instead of a bustling metropolis, a new city was still a new city, and she was excited to get to work in her grandfather’s bakery. The excitement was enough that it almost distracted her from the bobbing of the boat on the water, and the smell of salt on the cool breeze of this June morning, though occasionally a little bit of sea salt or a reflection of light off the sea would hit her eye and she’d find it hard to forget. The first day or two of the boat trip she’d had to repeatedly assure the people working on the ship that she wasn’t a teenager, despite choosing to keep her light brown hair in short pigtails, and that she  _ was  _ in fact 20 years old no matter how young they thought she was. There was some scrutiny over her ticket as well, suspected of being a fake so she could stow away, until a phone call to her parents put the sailors at ease. If there was one thing she’d note as a black mark on this trip so far, it’d be that. Well, that and the anxiety of moving somewhere else full time and not living with her parents any longer.

The boat suddenly jerking up as it crashed through a rather large wave brought her back to her senses, as did the sudden bustle of sailors running around past her to adjust the sails. Looking outwards, she could see the small coast town of Solburg; her current destination and the start of the last leg of her journey to her new home in Sunwich. It wasn’t much of a town really, mostly just a handful of small buildings and a convenience store forming something of a ring around a fairly large dock with several shipping and fishing boats and room for one more. Despite it being relatively early in the day she could only see two or three people that weren’t working at the docks in the town, and from this angle she really could see the entire thing. With a little bit of a sigh, she reached up to rub at the back of her neck nervously before heading below deck to retrieve her luggage. It didn’t look like her grandpa was waiting at the dock, but he’d never abandoned her before when she came out to visit him other times, back before he had moved to Sunwich.

“Maybe he’s just running late… yeah, that’s all it is. He’s probably flooded with customers! I am supposed to start working for him soon, after all,” she mumbled under her breath as she rooted around in the room she was staying on in the ship, organizing her various green outfits and the books she’d been reading to collect them all back into her suitcase, as well as her laptop and cell phone, before hauling it all up above deck again.

“That’s all it is. Nothing more. Abue Xin was just worried because I’m moving, that’s all…”

Despite that, she couldn’t help but remember the last conversation she had had with her great grandmother before deciding to move to Sunwich. A few months before it, she had mentioned looking for a job and struggling to find one at a family gathering, only to receive an odd phone call late at night.  
“Eve honey, it’s for you! It’s Abue Xin.” Her mother’s voice rang out down the hall from her room, and with a little bit of a sigh she rose up from her chair at her computer to check in. Not that she didn’t love her family, but from time to time she felt a little stuck in a rut living in one place and only talking to a small number of people. It didn’t help that despite being relatively well off for where they lived, her family wasn’t especially rich and lived in a rather small, isolated home. With three people and not very much floor space, home was always pretty stuffy. Stepping carefully down the hall, she nodded appreciatively to her mother before taking the phone.

“Hey Abue! What’s up? I didn’t expect a call from you this time of year.” Honestly, she didn’t expect one at all. Her great grandma wasn’t really much of one for technology, always preferring magic even as it went out of style in the modern era. Usually she wrote letters, if anything at all.   


“I apologize for contacting you so directly, but it’s urgent. I found you a job,” Her voice was hoarse and she coughed as she spoke, betraying her age of nearly 200 years old.

“Wait, what? You did? Where? And uh… why?” Eve stammered out her response, blinking a few times in sheer shock.

“Your grandfather Liang needs an assistant in Sunwich at his bakery. He told me a few days ago, and I remembered you saying you needed a job at that party a while back,” She said this matter-of-factly, as if surprised it wasn’t something Eve expected. The tone annoyed her a little bit, but she was still grateful for the opportunity for employment either way.

“So, so uh… He’ll hire me, just like that? And wait, why didn’t he call me then? He’s a lot more willing to use these things than you a-”   


“It was urgent I speak to you! There’s something important I wanted to say. I’m sorry, Eve, just hear me out. Sunwich is somewhere important to me. A very dear friend of mine used to live there, a long time ago,” her voice was wavering now, almost like she was on the verge of tears. In all her life, Eve had never heard her great grandma cry, and now it sounded like she was going to. “I know I don’t have very long left. And there are a lot of things I left undone, unsaid. It’s a vague hope, but if you meet a woman named Nyx Ronove, tell her… tell her I’m sorry. I’m sorry I couldn’t fix things before time ran out.”

“I-”

“Promise me, Eve! She’s a wisp mogwai, one of mine from when I was Ambassador.”   


“I… I promise. I’ll do it, Great Grandma.”

“Thank you. You’ll love Sunwich, it’s a beautiful place.” Click.

Horribly confused and more than a little worried, that phone call haunted Eve for most of the time it took for her to arrange the trip and talk to her parents about moving out to live with her grandfather. She didn’t tell them about the ominous message her great grandma closed with, nor her apparent worry of her own imminent death. Instead, she put it out of mind and tried to focus on the oncoming job, hoping that it was just senility. It was better than the alternative. Besides, she didn’t think she’d ever find this Nyx Ronove anyway. Even if Mogwai can live for centuries, the likelihood of meeting one her great grandma knew when she was young in the same city she had known her in was essentially zero.

But as she got off the ship in Solburg and found her grandfather still wasn’t there, there was a sinking feeling in her stomach. The wood of the dock creaked under her as she walked along it, looking for any sign of him, starting to panic. Sunwich was still a fair walk away, and she had never walked the path there before. It wouldn’t be hard for her to get lost. As she was about to start asking people if they had seen her grandfather, a woman stopped her by grabbing her wrist.

Turning to look at her, Eve was stunned to see the blue hair and incredibly pale skin of a Snowverian. But that suspicion only held for a few seconds, before she realized how supernaturally cold the woman’s hand was. It took only a moment longer than that to realize the look of pure shock on this woman’s face as she stared at Eve, mouth half-agape and lips quivering as she tried to find words. Words that didn’t seem to come no matter how she tried.

“E-E-Eve…? You l-look just like h-her… I’m N-Nyx. Your g-grandfather sent me t-to pick you up. He’s at the p-post office, getting a gift f-for you from Eve Xin.” It was then that the sinking feeling in her stomach bottomed out, and Eve Staccato nearly fainted on the spot, realizing immediately that she had been set up by her great grandmother somehow. Though she didn’t know the details, she knew that whatever came next would be far more than just a job with her grandfather working at a bakery.

“C-Come on, Eve. L-let’s go home, I’ll explain everything once we g-get there. And I’m sorry in advance for everything that I’m a-about to tell you.” And just like that, in stunned silence, she was pulled along into the wooded path from Solburg to Sunwich.


	3. Shadow Over Sunwich Forest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A barely begun journey is interrupted by a new friend, far too dangerous enemies, and a dangerous turn of events calls for an impulsive pact that will change the fate of Solum.

The two spent a good few minutes walking in silence through the winding path between Solburg and Sunwich. Nyx clearly wasn’t much of a talker, or at least Eve thought so given her relative silence as the shorter woman walked alongside her, only broken by the sound of her dragging her luggage awkwardly along the messy dirt path, wheels occasionally clicking and bouncing on stray rocks in the road. During their awkward silence, Eve took a moment to acclimate herself to the environment here. It was a little colder than back home, despite the sun shining brightly through the branches of the trees overhead, the slightly crisp air making her wish she had put her jacket on instead of stowing it in her luggage before getting off the ship.  


It was a pleasant enough place despite the temperature, a nice mix of greens and light browns defining most of the color palette. The sound of various forest creatures that she hoped weren’t feral Mogwai made it sound more lively and comfortable than the relative quiet of the wilderness she was accustomed to, as well. Though it took her a moment to realize that the noises were getting louder, and hadn’t been there a few moments before. When she realized that her eyes moved back to Nyx, who was suddenly a little bit tense, though still rather confidently leading the way along the path. Where before the blue-haired wisp was only looking forward, now her eyes were scanning the treeline around them, likely observing for the possible direction of the noises that Eve was now feeling more confidently were in fact probably ferals.  


“B-be careful, Eve. Th-there are a lot of f-ferals here lately and you’re unarmed. Stay c-close to me.” Nyx’s voice sounded surprisingly resolute despite her stutter, and though she was a little bit nervous, Eve couldn’t help but feel a little calmer knowing someone who apparently knew how to fight was nearby.  


“Are they that much of a threat here? There aren’t many Mogwai back home, but they’re all citizens of the town…” Eve muttered out through a shaky breath, scooting a little closer to her would-be protector.  


“You’d be s-surprised. Corona Woods used to b-be entirely safe, but l-lately the ferals here have been g-getting increasingly aggressive. It’s wh-why your g-grandpa is getting a p-package for you. It’s E-Eve Xin’s old w-weapon,” she explained between stammered breaths, manifesting a scythe in her hands while the sounds of animals got louder. From this distance it was apparent that the noises were ones of aggression, Mogwai somewhere in the trees making threats towards someone, though they and their quarry were both still out of sight for now.  


“Why would they be acting up so far from the Den, at such a remote human village? Didn’t the war end a long time ago?” Eve asked. Whatever answer Nyx had been about to offer was cut short, however, as a young woman with a camera and a ponytail came bursting out of the trees being chased by three tanuki with red eyes, sprinting full force back towards Solburg.  


“HEY GUYS MAYBE NOW’S A BAD TIME YOU SHOULD RUN THESE ONES ARE REALLY REALLY MAD OKAY BYE!” The strange woman shouted out in a half-mixture of terror and excitement as she fled, turning to face down the tanuki as she ran to snap a few pictures on her retreat. True to her word, the largest of the three suddenly spun mid-sprint to face Eve and Nyx, skidding across the ground and kicking up a great deal of dust and nearly slamming into a tree in its mindless aggression, only to use the trunk of it to push off of with its back feet to help give it a burst of acceleration towards them, jaws wide. Eve panicked in response to this, never exposed to any kind of combat before, and tried to duck and curl up with a terrified shout.  


Just as the tanuki’s jaws tried to find purchase in her flesh, Eve felt herself not-so-gently kicked aside, awkwardly rolling across the ground and coming to a stop on her side facing Nyx, as she held a scythe up handle-first into the mouth of the largest tanuki. The others were now trying to flank Nyx, and the mysterious third woman was left standing there using the opportunity to take more photos. She did at least have the courtesy to check in on Eve’s wellbeing, however, kneeling beside her between photos and checking her for injuries, as well as offering a hand to help her up.  


Now too busy grappling with one tanuki to really deal with the others, Nyx felt a sharp stabbing pain in her leg as one of the smaller two bit her calf, frustration surging through her at the insult of being hurt by such little pile of garbage with matted fur, though the red eyes filled her with a sense of foreboding and nostalgia for reasons she couldn’t quite trace, and a frown crossed her face instead of a pained grimace. In an attempt to wrench her scythe free, she punched the largest one in the gut with one of her hands balled into a fist and made it recoil, breaking the test of strength between the two of them and allowing her to actually swing the blade at the three wild animals. Though all three were fast and nimble enough to avoid getting hit by the blade itself, it seemed to suck the warmth right out of the air, quickly crystalizing ice all around them, a shard of it embedding itself in one of the tanuki despite its best attempts to avoid it. This weakened one broke off of the pack somewhat and lagged behind, trying to pry the ice out of its shoulder.  


The others, unfortunately, did not relent when their companion was harmed, and Nyx was beset upon by two at once, one striking out with claws while the other attacked with rudimentary flora magic. Knowing she could only manage to fully deflect one of these attacks, she raised her arms and created a barrier of ice in the air above her head when leaves began falling from the canopy above, edges suddenly as sharp as razors. The claws raking across her stomach certainly brought her pain, but not enough to do any serious damage outside of ripping holes in her shirt and welling up a tiny bit of blood.  


“Nyx! Are you alright?!” Eve cried out in horror at the sight of her new guardian being injured by the tanuki trio, though the sound of her voice was quickly hushed by the woman with the ponytail covering her mouth with a hand, whispering in a frightened tone.  


“Shhh! Let her handle this. That’s a Reaper.” The stranger muttered into Eve’s ear, pointing a Nyx as if the two didn’t know each other. “She’s way stronger than these three, trust me. Just don’t draw any attention to us. You’ll ruin my ability to take pictures of the fight if they try to attack us…”  


Pulling the hand off of her mouth, Eve practically sneered at this odd woman, “Are you really more worried about that than Nyx’s health?”  


As the other woman opened her mouth to respond, her eyes went wide and she let out a panicked scream, pointing at the fight again moments after Eve took her eyes off of it. Looking back, she saw the injured Tanuki bearing down on them, kicking up a cloud of dust behind it as it ran. Leaping into the air, it tried to slam itself into Eve again, and in reflex she rolled onto her back on the ground and kicked at it, foot striking home in its furry belly and sending the thing bouncing across the path into a tree where it lay still. From her vantage point in the fight, Nyx flashed Eve a quick smile and nod before swiping her scythe across the other small tanuki, leaving it similarly wounded and out of the fight.  


“Are y-you okay, Eve?” Nyx called out towards the young woman, perhaps not taking her current opponent seriously enough, as a sudden burst of razor sharp leaves fell from the trees above and left her looking shredded, shouting out in surprise more than anything as she didn’t even have time for the pain to register before she fell to her knees, then backwards from there onto her back. “Wh-what the hell is m-making you so strong…?”  


“NYX!!!” Despite the inherent danger in doing so, Eve quickly rose to her feet and sprinted towards the downed Reaper despite the third woman’s attempts to grab her wrist to stop her, skidding to a stop on her knees next to her and shaking her shoulders a little bit. “Are you okay? Please, get up. I can’t fight this thing, please please pl-”  


A hand on her cheek cut her off as Nyx laughed a little bit, shaking her head. “S-Sorry Eve, but you just l-looked so much like her wh-when she used to w-worry. I’m just n-not used to fighting without a c-conjurer. It’s r-really unprofessional of m-me to ask in a si-situa-situation like th-this, but would you make a pact with me? I c-can’t let myself f-fall here, with so m-much left undone.”  


Nyx offered Eve a little bit of a sad smile, one that quickly turned far more genuine when Eve nodded to her eagerly, tears welling up in her eyes. While she wasn’t typically one to scare easily, being attacked by incredibly strong feral Mogwai wasn’t exactly normal, especially so far from the Den. And her new friend, as well as the woman her great grandmother wanted her to give a message to, was so horribly injured in front of her. “Of course. Please, just... just get up!”  


A bright flash of yellow light emerged from Nyx as she started to look a bit better immediately, and the third woman, well aware of what she was about to see happen, leapt up to try to photograph the incident. “**Eve St-Staccato of Sunwich.**”  


The sudden change in Nyx’s voice is dramatic, echoing and deeper than the normal higher pitch, and resonating with obvious magical power. “**I can see that your h-heart is naive, but filled with i-incredible bravery. I, Nyx Ronove, w-will seal this pact and s-save our lives. Your heart is n-now mine, as mine is y-yours.**”  


With their pact sealed, Nyx suddenly burst with magical power, rising to her feet and charging the final tanuki in an unsettlingly fast blur that left a gust of frigid wind behind her. Done trying to subdue this mindless red-eyed beast without harming it, as it had injured her and her new charge, she instead did what Reapers do best. The terrifying act that earned them their namesake. Her hand plunged forward through its body effortlessly, and she took hold of its crystalline core in her hand directly. The tanuki writhed in rage, breathing out rancid air at her in a shrieking hiss of protest, and Eve, as if realizing what was coming based on the anger she could suddenly feel radiating from Nyx as if it were her own, hugged her knees on the ground and looked away. Even the mysterious third party refused to capture this on film, looking like she might be sick despite her own morbid curiosity.  


_CRUNCH._ The sound rang out loudly through the forest for a moment as Nyx closed her fist like a vice around the core and shattered it, and the tanuki evaporated into nothing around her hands. For a few moments, there was nothing but silence in the forest, though it was eventually broken by a shaky sigh from Nyx and an impressed whistle from the third woman.  


“I certainly didn’t expect to see something that horrible today. Let alone a girl making a pact with a Reaper. I thought you guys were illegal! Oh, thanks for saving me by the way. My name’s June Sanjo.” She stepped up to Nyx and offered her a handshake, before thinking better of it after what just happened and awkwardly letting her ponytail down instead to try to look like she never intended to offer one in the first place.  


“N-Nyx… You sh-shouldn’t be so careless out here. B-but I admit I’ve n-never seen any mogs l-like these out here before.”  


June nodded a couple of times, and stepped over to offer Eve help up. “Me either… I’m going to ask my mog obsessed friends on the internet about that later. I’ve never seen any with glowing red eyes until now. And even ferals usually aren’t that aggressive.”  


Nyx could only nod in response to that, staring down at her hand mutely for a moment. It had been a long, long time since the last time she crushed a core like that. The unsettling cracking feeling as she obliterated the soul of a living being wasn’t something she particularly liked about this existence, even if it did just save three lives. But she snapped out of that when Eve piped up, brushing dust off of her skirt. “Thanks for the assist, June. Uhm… what do you mean Nyx is a Reaper though? My abue told me she’s a Wisp.”  


June’s and Nyx’s faces contorted in surprise at that, and they shared an awkward look for a moment before the former spoke up, holding her camera up to check the film and starting to walk away. “I’ll uh… I’ll let her tell you that. She’s your Mogwai now after all! I wish I could find one, you’ve got me all jealous. But I can’t pact with any ferals… Hey, come visit me down in Solburg soon alright?”  


“Wait, you’re like me too?” Eve stammered out, a little surprised. Gay people weren’t exactly unheard of, but coming from such a small town knowing another one was nearby was still a little surprising.  


June stopped for a moment to stare at Eve like she was stupid, before shrugging and bursting out into laughter. “Uh, duh? A whole bunch of people out in this side of the middle of nowhere are. My cousin in Aeros is a Conjurer, too. To two minotaurs. You’d think she could’ve at least let me have one… Anyway, I seriously have to go! Bye Eve, bye Nyx!”  


As she ran off into down the path back to Solburg, Nyx and Eve both gave her slightly hesitant waves of farewell, unsure of how to react to her unending enthusiasm even in the face of near death. “Wh-what a weirdo… B-be careful around h-her in the future, Eve. L-let’s hurry home, o-okay? I’ll explain everything once w-we’re there.”  


“...Alright. But I hope it’s a good explanation. I still feel a little set up by abue Xin here. A-and I want to make sure gramps is okay, too! Those ferals were really tough.” Eve spoke with resolve in her voice, grabbing the discarded and now dust-covered luggage from the ground and following after Nyx towards Sunwich. “If I’m going to be a conjurer now, in circumstances like this, I want to learn to be a combat conjurer."  


“Y-yeah. We’ll be b-back soon. We c-can train with your new st-staff while I c-catch you up on things.” With that, Nyx took Eve’s hand in her own and started to much more hastily guide her to Sunwich, even opting to take a few shortcuts instead of sticking to the trail.


End file.
